Second Chance Sponsorships provide big return

It seems like a lot of the sponsorships of conferences or events or athletes don't provide a tonne of value to a company. That being said these sponsorships are important to the party that is being sponsored otherwise they would not be able to do what they do. But is it really a good use of your company's valuable marketing dollars, especially in these penny-pinching times?

Here are a couple of sponsorships that i've seen recently that were clearly a well thought out, strategic use of their money to create goodwill among their customers.

The Keg Restaurant - Celebration of Light

Each year, Vancouver has a fireworks competition that brings teams from around the world to the city to compete and provides 4 nights of free entertainment for locals while at the same time keeping restaurants, bars, and shops in the downtown area packed with people. Over the years the event has had trouble finding sponsors and entering this year they were a sponsor short of being able to put the show on. It was announced as being cancelled. Well within a short period of time of this announcement The Keg Restaurant (a canadian steakhouse chain) stepped up to the plate and contributed what i'm sure is not a huge chunk of their advertising dollars. The event was back on, all because of the Keg. So what happens? They get countless value out of the blogs/media coverage of their sponsorship that easily makes the amount of their sponsorship seem minimal.

Here's one such blog that published the event http://vancitybuzz.blogspot.com/2009/03/2009-celebration-of-light-vancouver.html


Vancouver Canucks playoff games in HD - Save-on-Foods

Being a Canadian city, Vancouver has some of the most passionate hockey fans in the world (if not the most passionate ie. i'm one of said fans). This year they are in the playoffs after missing last year and the city is buzzing with excitement. The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) is a public television network that has first rights to air canadian teams playoff games. They aired the first game from Vancouver in High Definition and it was found out after that games 3 and 4 to be played in St. Louis would not be televised in HD due to the extra cost associated with it $100,000. They had just gone through some rounds of layoffs and felt they could not justify the cost (weak excuse). Cue Save-on-Foods, a lower mainland based supermarket chain, who jumped in and basically said "$100,000??? That's it. We'll pay for you to have HD for our consumers." Boom! Now not everyone in the province has HD but even those without are going to be happy with Save-On for stepping up to the plate. This was a great sponsorship move and got buzz all over the radios and television stations throughout the province.

So maybe a sponsorship investment isn't the worst thing in the world for your company. Especially if it is for something that has a passionate following. Your generosity will fuel a lot of goodwill with those followers and they are quite likely to be pleased enough to spread the word to their network......especially if that something was on the verge of going kaput.

The automotive industry needs an advertising bailout

If you have seen one car commecial, you have seen them all. They all blend in to one soupy monotonous mash of person announcing that this "amazing car" gets you so many miles to the gallon, handles like a gem, and is as quiet as their empty showrooms. Well news to car companies, your not fooling anyone and you are all saying the exact same thing. So why would you continue to waste so much money on basically promoting the exact same car as your competition. Here's a crazy idea:

a) Design a car that is different from your competitors, get crazy with the look of a car
b) Have something in the car that differentiates you from every other car company out there and is actually of use to someone (just spitballing but apple is a pretty hip company maybe you can make an arrangement like Nike did with the ipod shoes)
c) Market the crap out of your unique offering (this is pretty much the first lesson in any marketing class)

It baffles me that car companies haven't been able to come up with something like this. As much as I don't really like Scion, at least they are thinking slightly outside the box and not trying to be everything to everyone. GM, Ford, and Chrysler seem to be mailing it in like a lot of the union workers that are on the line.

It also seems like none of these poor advertisements are available on YouTube which is definately a great way to help not drive traffic virally. Good thing they have now gotten to the point where they are appealing for national pride "Over half of these quality Pontiac products are made right here in Canada including......"

Well that did it, i'm sold. I'll buy a car for my country. And full disclosure, I own a GM product currently that I bought brand new 4 years ago and can say that it is not really the "quality" that a lot of these commercials tell me it is. My family has always owned GM so we are pretty loyal, but I can tell you this much, the loyalty ends after this car is done.

The easiest/most effective marketing tool

Happy employees who enjoy what they do.

That leads them to tell their network of friends about your company and also creates amazing viral opportunities such as this one shown on the Velopig blog (a daily breakfast blog expressing the blogger's feelings through pictures of his coffee and muffin).

Southwest Airlines gives their employees that ability to have fun instead of adhering to a strict corporate code heaved upon them by the higher-ups. The net result is an employee that has found a way to do his job which entertains him and at the same time entertains his audience (Southwest's customers). It's almost a guarantee that a good portion of the people walking off that airplane will then be passing on this unique experience to the person that picks them up and asks "How was your flight?". Great word of mouth marketing through a companies employees.

So instead of the consumers thinking about how little room they have and how they don't get a meal on the plane, they have a positive feeling after being engaged in an out-of-the box routine announcement.

Effective Email Creative webcast

I heard about this webinar through the AMA and found it incredibly informative so I will now pass it on to the 1 or 2 people that have miraculously found my blog.

It was titled "Top 10 things you need to know about effective email creative" and was put on by Jordan Ayan, CEO of SubscriberMail.

I recommend if your business runs email marketing campaigns you have a listen as Jordan brings up some interesting issues that could help you with future emailings.

I was especially intrigued by the information around optimizing an email so when the recipients have images turned off you are still able to get your message to them. I have had the problem in the past where i've received emails back from people saying our messages are tough to read, etc., etc. and the returned emails always show the recipient as having images turned off. As Jordan also points out, the majority of business consumers (90%) have their images disabled on their email accounts. As my company is primarily in the B2B field this is a huge portion of our targets that may be having trouble viewing our emails. I think its time to optimize!

Here is the full presentation: http://blog.subscribermail.com/2009/03/30/video-webinar-top-10-things-you-need-to-know-about-developing-effective-email-creative/

True Service

Kal-Tire has got it right.

And their brand/image is incredible for an industry that is typically seen as a bunch of grease pigs that rip off the consumers.

Kal-Tire's slogan,"True Service.", is a bold statement. But one they back up.. To be honest, I have never heard anyone say anything bad about them because they treat each customer great, and clearly have a strategy of building an ongoing relationship with every individual that walks through the door. Everyone needs tires, and they will need tires throughout their lives. Why not build a good relationship with every customer.

Now when someone walks through a tire store's door they are at the company's mercy, they are more than likely frustrated, and they are probably irritable.

Yesterday I had the good fortune of waking up to a flat tire and after figure out my jack and lugnut wrench I threw on the magnificent looking donut of a spare tire. With this in place I headed to Kal-Tire to see about repairing the flat or getting a new one. I dropped it off and heard from them after 2 hours. "Your front one is not repairable, but we were able to fix your right rear tire which also needed it." So they went above and beyond to make sure the rest of my tires were okay, fine i'll gladly pay the extra amount for that service. They didn't have the tire I needed to replace the damaged front tire but were quick to refer me to a place that would have them. Perfect.

So I went in after work to pick up my car and got to the counter, "Here is your total charge and that includes a discount too." Huh? What did I do to deserve a discount? Nothing, I chose Kal-Tire and they know the value in having a happy customer who will bring their car back to them for any future tire problems.

That my friends is True Service, and truly an impressively run company.

Something to think about the next time you are trying to figure out what image your brand should project in your customers minds. How can you build a better relationship with customers to extend your customer lifecycle?

Powerpoint, the rubix cube of technology? I don't think so

I am from the younger generation, the web saavy generation if you will so it is tougher for me to grasp the concept of not being able to work technology. But is there really an excuse for not knowing how to work a powerpoint presentation???? It really should be unfathomable. It's not like as a presenter you don't think about the talk you are going to give and maybe write out some notes in preparation. So why would you not take the 5 minutes to learn how to use powerpoint? I say this because I was at a symposium yesterday and 1 out of 6 speakers seemed fully capable of using their powerpoint. 1 out of 6!!!!! That is an embarassing number. These were all BUSINESS PROFESSIONALS who were experts in their field, yet they struggled with issues such as exiting a presentation and opening their own.....come on. There is no excuse for not knowing how to work a powerpoint presentation on a laptop. You could put a monkey up there with 30 minutes of instructions and he could pull it off almost flawlessly. His hands might mash the keyboard a little too much but he would get through his presentation on climate change.

Just a little bit of ranting on a hump-day from this guy.

Sales promotion a true art form

With the recession in full force across North America it is tough to walk down a street and not see some kind of sign in a businesses window offering a sales promotion to entice prospects into purchasing. But what happens as we start to work our way out of the recession? People will have become addicted to sales because thats all they will know. Will there be a worldwide Intervention by major retailers to inform you that the sales no longer apply???? If so, I hope Jack Von Vonderen runs it, now thats an interventionist. Great mustache too.

What is the effect that these sales promotions will have on a company's brand image?

For example, I am part of Banana Republic Canada's e-mail database and they send me information on sales, etc. For the first 4 to 6 months that I was on the list I got maybe one offer for a 20% off one day only sale, which still seemed like a good offer. They make good quality, fashionable merchandise, at a mid-level price. There clothes are not cheaply priced, nor are they in the league of a Harry Rosen. That was until now. In the last 3 months I believe I have gotten at least one offer every month for a MINIMUM of 30% off, most of the time for an entire week or weekend.

Now obviously most people understand why they are doing this, the economic times mean you have to entice more consumers to purchase your products to meet your organizations sales goals. So you put items on sale and get more people in the door that way, including those that are not usually your regular market.

So what does that mean for the future, does this erode Banana Republic's brand image now that more and more people can afford to buy it? What happens when the sales dry-up? How many customers will they lose and will it lead to a counter-effect where they need to start producing clothes cheaper to hold on to these consumers that expect their items to be cheaper.

I assume there is quite a struggle going on between marketing and the sales teams at Banana Republic these days, but it is probably overshadowed by the increased volume they do everytime they push out another sale. I just wonder what the future consequences may be.